Jim Beely

All of author Chris Harding Thornton‘s novels take place in in Nebraska.

All two of them.

The first, the powerful and evocative Pickard County Atlas (2021), takes place in July 1978, and  follows bored-to-death middle-aged sheriff’s deputy Harley Jensen, as he drives up and down the sleepy nighttime streets of a small town in Pickard County during a sweltering summer. He’s going nowhere, praying for something–anything–to happen.

And then he gets his wish–in spades, in a noirish, well-received series kick-off that Tana French called  “an atmospheric, slow-burning beauty of a book, rich with raw-edged lyricism and achingly real characters,” and that Tom Nolan praised for it carrying “all the earmarks of great noir… an instant literary classic. I cannot wait to see what Chris Harding Thornton has in store for us next.” 

So, a great series debut, but not exactly a private eye novel, right?

Except… the follow-up, 2024’s Little Underworld switches protagonists and settings, transporting us to Prohibition-era Omaha, and the comings and goings of a former police officer-turned-private investigator JIM BEELY,  who gets caught in the act of disposing of a body by Frank Tvrdik, a corrupt and ruthless cop. Doncha just hate when that happens?

With no way out, Jim has no choice but to help Tvrdik take down an ambitious local politico Elmer Kobb with eyes on the city’s lucrative (but illegal) liquor trade.

It’s a dark and disturbing plunge into Omaha’s less than shining history; its grim cynicism only occasionally leavened by blasts of black humor.